This week I’ve decided to focus on the Diamond League athletics in Monaco, an important meeting in the run-up to the World Championships next month. As well as looking at the meeting itself, I wanted to consider the effect that a spate of injuries to top competitors will have on the level of competition, and whether the profile of the World Championships will be affected by the absence of some of the great rivalries that make athletics so entertaining.
The countdown to the World Championships continued on Friday with an eventful Diamond League meeting in Monaco.
The sporting action was nearly overshadowed by a bizarre incident involving two French athletes. After the men’s 1500m race, France’s Mehdi Baala and Mahiedine Mekhissi-Benabbad came to blows and had to be separated by officials. Both men have since been provisionally suspended.
However, this incident should not be allowed to obscure what was a hugely entertaining evening of athletics. For British fans, there was plenty to cheer about, most notably another excellent performance from Mo Farah. Farah produced a great performance to beat a world-class field and win the 5000m, setting a new British record in the process. Based on recent evidence, Farah’s move to the USA seems to be paying dividends, and he must now be regarded as a strong gold medal contender in Daegu.
The performance of Tiffany Ofili-Porter in the 100m hurdles also provided encouragement. The former American had struggled to find her best form at previous meetings, but she too produced a record-breaking run to finish third behind Australia’s Sally Pearson and American Kellie Wells. Meanwhile, Phillips Idowu shrugged off his ongoing dispute with head of UK Athletics Charles van Commenee to win the triple jump with a leap of 17.36m.
However, Idowu’s victory also signified another prevalent trend ahead of the World Championships. This trend will be of concern to Diamond League organisers, as it has the potential to undermine the basis of the series itself. It can be described as the lack of those big rivalries, those titanic head-to-head battles, that can really ignite a competition. The Diamond League was supposed to provide more of these, but its record so far has been mixed. It’s not the organisers that are responsible, but rather that constant fear that lurks in the mind of every athlete: injury.
It’s because of injuries that we’ve been deprived of some of those great head-to-head contests. This can be seen most clearly in the sport’s highest-profile event, the men’s 100m. Here, an injury to Usain Bolt at the beginning of the season meant the two hardly raced each other, and now a hip injury to Tyson Gay means that they will not meet at the World Championships either. The 100m will still be a hugely exciting event, but there’s no doubt that this is a major blow.
And this isn’t the only event to be affected. The men’s triple jump has been one of the most entertaining events of this season, largely thanks to the absorbing battle between Phillips Idowu and Teddy Tamgho. Tamgho’s season-ending injury is, in one way, good news for British athletics fans, in that it makes a gold medal in Daegu more likely. However, it also deprives Idowu of the chance to prove himself on the world stage against his greatest rival. It also takes a lot of the edge off the competition. It’s hard not to imagine that, had Tamgho been there in Monaco, Idowu would have needed more than the 17.36m he produced to secure victory. Great rivalries force athletes to push themselves to the limit; in their absence things can be a bit too easy.
But it’s not all doom and gloom. Certainly, to claim that the World Championships will be seriously damaged by lack of competition would be to go much too far. For one thing, the absence of a great name can inspire other, lesser-known athletes to produce great performances. Look at the men’s 100m: the headlines will say it was another victory for Usain Bolt, but he was pushed all the way by his countryman Nesta Carter who finished just 0.02s behind him. It would be disrespectful to the athletes to suggest that an event is devalued by the absence of one headline-grabbing competitor. These days, the general skill level is so high that there are plenty of worthy replacements ready to step in if a big name has to pull out.
The problem is that, with the sport aiming to increase its public profile ahead of London 2012, athletics needs all the headlines it can grab. And, unfair as it may be, people simply aren’t as interested in people they haven’t heard of. A World Championships with no Bolt v Gay and no Idowu v Tamgho will be no less significant, and probably no less entertaining. We’ll just have to hope that the viewing public give the athletes a chance to prove that.
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